


In the Still of the Night

by Elennare



Category: A Traveller In Time - Alison Uttley
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-03
Updated: 2015-01-03
Packaged: 2018-03-05 02:04:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3101075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elennare/pseuds/Elennare
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nights in Penelope's life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Still of the Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lost_spook](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_spook/gifts).



> Written for lost_spook as part of my [500 prompts meme](http://elen-nare.livejournal.com/64282.html). Prompt was: In the still of the night - Penelope (A Traveller in Time).

 

In the still of the night, Penelope wakes in her bed at Thackers. Still sleepy, she is unsure whether the quiet breathing next to her is her sister Alison’s, or Tabitha’s. It doesn’t matter. Whenever she is, she is at Thackers. She is safe.

***

In the still of the night, Penelope buries her face in her pillow to silence her sobs. The Babingtons are gone. Francis is gone. And while she can put on a brave face during the day, cling to hope that some time, she will see them all again, in the small hours it can be too hard to endure.  


***

  
In the still of the night, Penelope rolls over, away from the window where the harsh glare of London streetlights comes in. She is alone in her room now, the only child left in the house; her sister is married, and Ian lives at Thackers, learning the farmer’s trade from Uncle Barnabas so he can take over when his uncle becomes too old. He says he will bring her to Thackers when she is grown up, too, and she can keep house as Aunt Tissie does, but Penelope doubts. She has noticed how a neighbouring farmer’s daughter, Anna, is mentioned more and more in his letters, and she suspects - hopes - there will be a new family at Thackers.

***

  
In the still of the night, Penelope is wakened by the ring of the telephone bell. She runs to answer it, but her father - his room much nearer - reaches it before she can go down the stairs. She waits at the top of the flight, sees his face change, and knows it’s the news they have been dreading. Her new niece or nephew was due soon, but it’s been a difficult pregnancy, and something must have gone wrong at Thackers. She thinks she is ready to hear it, but when her father turns to her mother, waiting next to him, and says - his voice broken - “it’s Anna”, her heart falters and she slides down to sit on the steps, tears already running down her face.

***

  
In the still of the night, Penelope wakes to a child tugging on her hand, calling her. She looks down - it’s little Barney, the youngest of Ian’s children, tear tracks on his cheeks.

“Bad dreams?” she asks quietly, and he nods, whispers something about a monster in the curtains.

Rising, she lifts him gently and puts him into her own bed - she knows he’ll never go back to sleep in his own. Here, he cuddles up to her as she sings a lullaby in low, sweet tones, and falls asleep almost at once.

***

  
In the still of the night, Penelope stirs, restless, as she dreams. She made the Christmas cake and sweets today, as she has for years and years now, following the recipes that have been handed down by generations of Taberners. Ian’s sons and daughters are children no longer, but Cicely - the eldest - brought her own little son to ‘help Aunt Penelope’. Which really meant, of course, to scrape the bowl and enjoy marchpane cut-offs as his great-aunt and mother chattered (and had a scraping or two of the bowl themselves). Now, in Penelope’s dream, the memory of the day mixes with all the other Christmas cakes she made, or helped make - Aunt Tissie’s, and Dame Cicely’s, and her own.

***

  
In the still of the night, Penelope wakes, heart beating fast though she knows not why. She springs from the bed, and is amazed at the ease with which she can do so. Beginning to guess, she looks at her hands - no longer those of an old woman, they are smooth and unlined as any girl’s. She rushes to the window, flings open the curtains, and it is no longer dark but the first pale light of dawn. A boy’s whistle, clear as a blackbird’s, floats up. Greensleeves - and she knows for sure. Laughing, she runs towards the door, to rejoin the old Thackers forever.

 

 

 


End file.
